In 1925, just seven years after Fordham Law School admitted its first women and one year after the first female graduated, Lillian Rosenbaum graduated from Fordham Law.
Ninety-five years later, her grandson, bankruptcy lawyer Peter Friedman, has made a generous gift to provide one summer fellowship a year for 10 years to Fordham Law students working in the public interest.
Rosenbaum was the child of immigrants and the first in her family to attend law school. Friedman hopes the fellowship can help other first-generation law students, as well as students working on issues like voting rights and immigration, which “our family cares about very much.”
Any Fordham Law student with a demonstrated interest in public service can apply for the fellowship. Friedman says he hopes the fellowships will provide key support to “launch someone into a career” in public service.
Friedman says his grandmother, who passed away in 2002 at age 98, was very proud of her Fordham Law experience. He believes there must have been challenges for a Jewish woman in law school in the 1920s, but says she was “not the kind of person who I think would’ve been intimidated.” Instead, he thinks “she would’ve been lively, sometimes feisty.”
According to family lore, Friedman’s great grandmother encouraged Rosenbaum to attend law school because she thought it would be a good place to meet a husband. Rosenbaum’s father had died when she was young, and Friedman believes she would have chosen Fordham to stay in New York near her mother and sisters.
“She ended up marrying a bellboy instead of a lawyer,” Friedman shared.
Though Rosenbaum did not end up practicing law, Friedman says he “always admired her intellect and thoughtfulness.” His grandfather, the erstwhile bellhop turned successful business owner, admired that about her as well.
Friedman, a partner in the Washington, D.C., office of O’Melveny & Myers, says the legal profession has been “terrific” to him. “I’ve had a tremendous number of great experiences,” he says. As a bankruptcy lawyer whose clients have included the government of Puerto Rico, he says his experience has been “very public service oriented in private practice.”
In addition to Lillian Rosenbaum’s law school experience, Friedman says the fellowship was also inspired by his daughter Annabelle, who he notes “has many more opportunities than my grandmother would’ve had.” Friedman’s daughter is a sophomore public policy and global studies student at the University of North Carolina.
Friedman says his family is fortunate that his daughter is able to pursue her interest in public service, including a summer internship at a community justice organization in North Carolina. He hopes the fellowship can help a Fordham student “for whom it might be more of a financial barrier” to do public interest work.
With that legacy, Friedman notes that “our family was just really into giving back to the community,” and he is pleased to be able to do so at Fordham, “a great institution in New York City.”